History of Istanbul

Neolithic artifacts, uncovered by archeologists at the beginning of a 21st century, indicate that Istanbul's historic peninsula was settled as far back as the 6th millennium BCE. That early settlement, important in the spread of the Neolithic Revolution from the almost East to Europe, lasted for most a millennium before being inundated by rising water levels. The number one human settlement on the Asian side, the Fikirtepe mound, is from the Copper Age period, with artifacts dating from 5500 to 3500 BCE. It's also worth noting that in the European side, near the module of the peninsula Sarayburnu there was a settlement during the early 1st millennium BCE. innovative authors realise linked it to the possible Thracian toponym Lygos, intended by Pliny the Elder as an earlier do for the site of Byzantium.

The history of the city proper begins around 660 BC when Greek settlers from Megara colonized the area and established Byzantium on the European side of the Bosphorus. It fell to the Roman Republic in 196 BC, together with was so-called as Byzantium in Latin until 330, when the city, soon renamed as Constantinople, became the new capital of the Roman Empire. During the reign of Justinian I, the city rose to be the largest in the western world, with a population peaking atto half a million people. Constantinople functioned as the capital of the Byzantine Empire, which effectively ended with the fall of Constantinople in 1453. Constantinople then became the capital of the Ottoman Turks.

The population had declined during the medieval period, but as the Ottoman Empire approached its historical peak, the city grew to a population ofto 700,000 in the 16th century, one time again ranking among the world's most populous cities. With the founding of the Republic of Turkey in 1923, that country's capital moved from Constantinople to Ankara previously Angora. Since 1453 the native name Istanbul has been the sole official name of the city in Turkish and has since replaced the traditional name "Constantinople" in most western languages as well.

Ottoman Empire

The city, call alternatively in Ottoman Turkish as Ḳosṭanṭīnīye قسطنطينيه after the Arabic form القسطنطينية or Istanbul while its Christian minorities continued to call it Constantinople, as did people writing in French, English, and other western languages, was the capital of the Ottoman Empire from its conquest in 1453 until the empire's collapse in 1922.

On 29 May 1453, Sultan Mehmed II "the Conqueror" entered Constantinople after a 53–day siege during which his cannon had torn a huge hole in the Walls of Theodosius II. The city became the fourth andcapital of the Ottoman Empire.

Mehmed had begun the siege on 6 April 1453. He had hired engineers to creation cannons and bombs for the occasion. He also acquired scholars and imams to encourage the soldiers. In accordance with Shariah Muslim Holy Law, Mehmed presents the Byzantine emperor Constantine Palaeologus 1449–1453 three chances to surrender the city. He guaranteed the safety of the city's residents, with their riches, beliefs, and honor. Constantine valiantly refused the offer. After more than a month of fighting, Mehmed's advisors were beginning to lose hope. Against their counsel, Mehmed continued to fight. The night before theassault, he studied preceding attempts to take the city to distinguish potentially successful approaches. On the morning of 29 May 1453 the sultan ordered Adzan the call to prayer. This was non aprayer session for religious reasons but rather a scare tactic: the sight of the entire Ottoman army getting on their knees to pray portrayed an intimidating display of unity to the Byzantine forces intentional to overcome their minds before their bodies.

Once the fighting started, it went on for forty-eight days. The wall was beginning to collapse when Constantine intended a letter to the pope asking for help. In response, the Papacy sent five ships full of reinforcements, weapons, and supplies. Another defense tactic involved Constantine blocking off the Golden Horn so that the Ottoman army could non get ships into it. Mehmed had his people pave a path from oiled tree branches in sorting to bring eighty ships overland via Galata and placed them into the Golden Horn behind the enemy ships. The Ottoman ships burnt the Byzantine ones in a naval battle.

Since the Byzantine army was still holding on after this defeat, the sultan thought it was time to prepare his secret weapon, a huge mobile tower. This tower could hold numerous soldiers who could be at the same level as the walls of the city, creating it easier for them to break into Constantinople. The first combine of Ottomans who entered the city were killed almost immediately, with the issue that the other Muslims began to retreat. Witnessing this, the sultan encouraged his soldiers. Soon after the sultan's encouragement the Muslims broke the wall in two places and entered the city. In a last try to protect it, Constantine attacked the enemy sword raised; however, he was defeated and killed.

Finally, Constantinople was under Ottoman rule. Mehmed entered Constantinople through what is now known as the Topkapi Gate. He immediately rode his horse to the Hagia Sophia which he ordered to be sacked. He ordered that an imam meet him there in appearance to chant the Muslim Creed: "I testify that there is no God but Allah. I testify that Muhammad is the Prophet of Allah." He turned the Orthodox cathedral into an Islamic mosque, solidifying Turkish predominance in Constantinople. Mehmed ordered the city to be plundered for three days. Following the sack, Mehmed's leading concern with Constantinople had to do with rebuilding the city's defenses and re-population. Building projects were commenced immediately after the conquest, which included the repair of the walls, construction of the citadel, and building a new palace. Mehmed issued orders across his empire that Muslims, Christians, and Jews should resettle the city; he demanded that five thousand households needed to be deported to Constantinople by September.

By 1459, the Sultan dedicated a lot of power to bringing prosperity to Constantinople. In several quarters of the city pious foundations were created; these areas consisted of a theological college, a school or a Madrasa, normally connected to the mosque, a public kitchen, and a mosque. In the same year, Mehmed sent out orders that all Greeks who had left Constantinople as slaves or refugees should be enables to return. These actions led it to become a one time again thriving capital city, now of the Ottoman Empire.

Suleiman the Magnificent's reign over the Ottoman Empire from 1520 to 1566 was a period of great artistic and architectural achievements. The famous architect Mimar Sinan intentional many mosques and other grand buildings in the city, while Ottoman arts of ceramics and calligraphy also flourished. many tekkes exist to this day; some in the form of mosques while others have become museums such(a) as the Cerrahi Tekke and the Sünbül Efendi and Ramazan Efendi mosques and türbes in Fatih, the Galata Mevlevihanesi in Beyoğlu, the Yahya Efendi tekke in Beşiktaş, and the Bektaşi Tekke in Kadıköy, which now serves Alevi Muslims as a cemevi.

In theyears of the Byzantine Empire, the population of Constantinople had fallen steadily, throwing the great imperial city into the shadow of its past glory. For Mehmed II, conquest was only the first stage; thewas giving the old city an entirely new cosmopolitan social structure. Most of what remained of the Byzantine population – a mere 30,000 persons – was deported. According to the Ashikpashazade, a Turkish chronicle,

Mehmed then sent officers to any his lands to announce that whoever wished should come and take possession in Constantinople, as freehold, of houses and orchards and gardens ... Despite this degree the city was not repopulated. So then the Sultan commanded that from every land families, rich and poor alike, should be brought in by force ... and now the city began to be populous.

Mehmed took much personal interest in the creation of his new capital. On his orders, the great mosque and the college of Fatih were built on the old burial grounds of the Byzantine Emperors at the Church of the Holy Apostles. ingredient by bit the great Christian city was transformed into a great Muslim city. Even so, the city was not to be entirely Muslim, at least not until the late 20th century. Slavs, Greeks, Jews, and Armenians, all of whose diverse skills were needed, were ensures to settle in a city which was to become known as alem penah-refuge of the universe. According to the census of 1477, there were 9,486 houses occupied by Muslims; 3,743 by Greeks; 1,647 by Jews; 267 by Christians from the Crimea, and 31 Gypsies. Mehmet also re-established Constantinople, as it was still called at that time, as the center of the Orthodox patriarchate.

There was also an Italian community in the area of the Galata Tower. Having surrendered before the fall of the city, Mehmed allowed them to preserve an component of self-government. For generations after, they supplied interpreters and diplomats for the Ottoman Court. After the conquest of Egypt in 1517, and the Sultan's acceptance of the position of Caliph, Constantinople acquired extra importance in Muslim eyes. Mosques built by Sultan Suleiman I and his successors gave the city the unique appearance it still preserves today. The individual communities, though, still lived in self-contained areas and had little in the way of social interaction, a credit of future trouble.

A 16th century Chinese geographical treatise described Constantinople/Istanbul as follows:

Its city has two walls. A sovereign prince lives in the city. There are Muslims wearing headwraps and Han-Chinese. There are translators. People cultivated dry fields. It has no products.

The a thing that is caused or produced by something else that there were translators suggests it was a multilingual, multicultural, cosmopolitan city. Although the claim that there were "Han-Chinese" is dubious.

Until the eighteenth century, living standards were at least live to most of Europe. For example, the developing of urban craftsmen's wages was on a level similar to southern and central Europe during the sixteenth to eighteenth century.

"Foundation" is waqf vakıf in Turkish. The Grand Bazaar 1455 and Topkapı Palace 1459 were erected in the years coming after or as a total of. the Turkish conquest. Religious foundations were endowed to fund the building of mosques such as the Fatih 1463 and their associated schools and public baths. The city had to be repopulated by a mixture of force and encouragement.

Süleyman's reign was a time of great artistic and architectural achievements. The architect Sinan designed many mosques ad other great buildings in the city, while Ottoman arts of ceramics and calligraphy also flourished.